Canberra Liberals Leader Mark Parton will move to censure City Services Minister Tara Cheyne today over the closure of libraries on Sundays and the bungled introduction of camera-detected seatbelt fines.
Mr Parton has said that Ms Cheyne defied a June 18 Assembly motion calling on the government to pause the Sunday closures, which went ahead from August 27.
“The Assembly told this Government to pause the Sunday library closures. Tara Cheyne ignored that vote and shut the doors anyway,” Mr Parton said.
Cheyne has said the change followed an independent review that found inefficient staffing was behind frequent unplanned closures, and that visit data showed library demand was concentrated on weekdays.
He is also targeting the minister over almost 13,000 seatbelt infringements issued after camera enforcement began in November, before the government discovered the cameras had not been properly authorised for seatbelt detection.
Camera-detected seatbelt enforcement began in November 2025, after the Assembly unanimously passed legislation introduced by Cheyne enabling the cameras in September that year.
By August 2026, close to 13,000 infringement notices had been issued before officials discovered a legal instrument had not been updated to explicitly authorise the cameras for seatbelt detection. Fines were paused for two weeks while the gap was fixed and are now being issued again.
The ACT Government is now seeking Assembly support for separate legislation to retrospectively validate the earlier fines, expected to be debated during the current September sitting weeks. Parton has previously said the Canberra Liberals are “not of a mind” to support it.
Mr Parton said Ms Cheyne’s portfolio issued almost 13,000 seatbelt fines on cameras that “were not lawfully authorised”.
“That is not a footnote. That is a failure of basic administration.”
Mr Parton said the two issues warranted the Assembly censuring Ms Cheyne.
The censure motion will be debated in the Legislative Assembly today.
News all day, every day at CityNews.com.au.
Who can be trusted?
In a world of spin and confusion, there’s never been a more important time to support independent journalism in Canberra.
If you trust our work online and want to enforce the power of independent voices, I invite you to make a small contribution.
Every dollar of support is invested back into our journalism to help keep citynews.com.au strong and free.
Thank you,
Ian Meikle, editor
Leave a Reply